jueves, 10 de noviembre de 2011

POLICE ANTI-NAZI CAMPAIGN SUCCESSFUL

Norwegian special police tactics managed to discourage several people from continuing as neo-Nazis.

Officers at police stations, particularly at Manglerud in Oslo, exercised special techniques they had developed, calling youths in for conversations about their views. Approximately 200 of these preventative discussions, often including parents and perhaps a child welfare services representative, were conducted in a narrow room with six chairs and an oval table. Police also had regular contact with the parents to ensure things were kept in check. “The discussion [method] arose because of a challenge we faced with a Right-Extremist environment that used violence, threats, and other types of crime in the mid-90s in Oslo’s Nordstrandsplatået area,” Police Superintendent Bjørn Øvrum, who headed the operation, tells NRK. According to the broadcaster, a new Master’s thesis written by a former neo-Nazi student at the University of Stavanger now for the first time documents police methods used on eight people in the ‘90s, with a 100 percent success rate.

Describing how police-parent cooperation worked, the now 36-year old, former leader of the Haugesund-based group named Einzats, writes, “it was extremely annoying. Every time there was a concert, demo, or a real party (...) my mother and father came and said they had already made other plans [for us]. It was inescapable. Now I understand why.” The student also alleges officers never called him in for a discussion, but says contact with two people whilst in jail was one decisive reason for rejecting extremism. “They [a cook and a warder] made huge efforts to meet me halfway, confront my attitudes, and treat me with respect, whilst at the same time questioning what I stood for.”



Increasing


Whilst police methods were successful then, Right-Wing extremism is now on the rise in Norway following Anders Behring Breivik's twin massacres. Kari Helene Partapuoli, head of NGO the Norwegian Centre against Racism, told The Foreigner recently that, "People who used to be active are now inspired. The organisations are hell-bent on surviving. Some people say ‘we hate what he [Breivik]did, but he’s not going to ruin it for us’, using arguments about freedom of speech.” The mass murderer sent his manifesto just before his attacks to several people, including 250 British contacts. Amongst these were members of the English Defence League (EDL) and the British National Party (BNP), whose Facebook supporters freely express their attitudes on their profiles. The EDL subsequently denied any contact with the mass murderer, but Norwegian police questioned the movement's blogger Paul Ray on several occasions to establish any possible connections. Moreover, in what was believed to be an unconnected raid, officers from Nordre Buskerud Police District arrested a neo-Nazi just over one month later following a tip-off. Explosives, a police uniform, and illegal weapons were found.

Outside Norway, a new study by British think tank Demos, called “The New Face of Digital Populism”, concludes that Right-Wing extremism is also increasing. Jamie Bartlett, one of the report's authors and Head of the Violence and Extremism Programme at Demos, comments, "Populist parties and movements are now a force to be reckoned with in many Western European countries. These groups are known for their opposition to immigration, their ‘anti-establishment’ views and their concern for protecting national culture. Their rise in popularity has gone hand-in-hand with the advent of social media, and they are adept at using new technology to amplify their message, recruit and organise." The Guardian interviewed Dutch MEP Emine Bozkurt who leads the European Parliament’s anti-racism lobby. She warns that, “We're at a crossroads in European history." “In five years' time we will either see an increase in the forces of hatred and division in society, including ultra-nationalism, xenophobia, Islamophobia and anti-Semitism, or we will be able to fight this horrific tendency."

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